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.TH PCP.CONF 5 "PCP" "Performance Co-Pilot"
.SH NAME
\f3pcp.conf\f1 \- the Performance Co-Pilot configuration and environment file
.\" literals use .B or \f3
.\" arguments use .I or \f2
.SH SYNOPSIS
.I /etc/pcp.conf
.SH DESCRIPTION
When using Performance Co-Pilot (PCP) tools and utilities
and when calling PCP library functions, a standard set of
environment variables are defined in
.IR /etc/pcp.conf .
These variables are generally used to specify the location of
various PCP pieces in the file system and may be loaded into
shell scripts by sourcing the
.IR /etc/pcp.env (5)
shell script and queried by C/C++ programs using the
.IR pmGetConfig (3)
library function.
If a variable is already defined in the environment,
the values in
.I pcp.conf
do
.B not
override those values, i.e. the values in
.I pcp.conf
serve as installation defaults only.
.PP
Both the
.I pcp.env
and
.I pcp.conf
files are expected to be found in
.I /etc
by default.
If required, the
.I pcp.conf
file may be relocated and
.B PCP_CONF
set in the environment to specify the full path to the new location.
The
.I pcp.env
file can not be relocated (this is the only hard coded path
required by PCP).
.PP
The syntax rules for
.I pcp.conf
are as follows :
.IP 1. 4
the general syntax is
.br
.ce 1
.B "PCP_VARIABLE_NAME=variable value to end of line"
.IP 2. 4
lines that begin with
.B #
and all blank lines are ignored.
.IP 3. 4
all variables must be prefixed with
.BR PCP_ .
This is a security issue - variables that do not have this prefix will
be silently ignored.
.IP 4. 4
there should be no space between the variable name and the literal
.B =
and no space between the
.B =
and the variable value (unless the value actually starts with a space).
This is required because the
.I pcp.conf
file may be sourced directly by Makefiles as well as interpreted by the
.I pcp.env
script and the
.I "pmGetConfig"
function.
.IP 5. 4
variable values may contain spaces and should
.B not
be quoted.
The
.I pcp.env
script automatically quotes all variable values from the character
immediately following the
.B =
through to the end of the line.
.PP
For further details and an explanation of the use of
each variable, see the comments in the
.I /etc/pcp.conf
file itself.
.SH ENVIRONMENT
The
.B PCP_CONF
environment variable specifies an alternative path to the
.I pcp.conf
file.
.SH SEE ALSO
.BR PCPIntro (1),
.BR pmconfig (1),
.BR PCPIntro (3),
.BR PMAPI (3),
.BR pmGetConfig (3)
and
.BR pcp.env (5).
